Santa Cruz Alcohol Appreciation #2: Northern California Chardonnay

BK and I’ve been on a quest to enjoy white wine, so we decided to have our second chapter of Santa Cruz AA focus on that most ubiquitous of Californian whites, Chardonnay.

We ended up with about 15 bottles of wine, although we only listed about 10 of them on our board. I think it was precisely because we had so much wine that we lost track. It may also be why it took me almost two months to write about this event, which was our June edition.

We didn’t take the best of notes this time — but I think we have learned that neither bk nor I really like northern California Chardonnay. We’re better off sticking to dry roses and other whites when we want a chilled wine, it seems. Still, that doesn’t mean we didn’t try our darndest to give it a good, fighting chance. Here are some of the tasting notes I could decipher.

Charles Shaw: sweet but not terrible/ I like! / a little hard to swallow/fruity and fresh/nice aftertaste/long lasting notes but a bit dry/too tanin-y– works but not the best

Rex Goliath: too much/ urine/ lost taste right there

Loma Prieta: not bad and good price/goodish

I really don’t think we could come up with a consensus on this. The 2-buck Chuck ranked about the same as the more expensive varieties, but that doesn’t say much for any of them. If I had to choose, I’d say the top two favorites were the Charles Shaw and the Bonterra.

We all pretty much gave up after tasting 10 wines. It was just too much in too many ways!